R.I.P Steve Jobs 1955 – 2011

Our deepest condolences go out to Steve Jobs’ family and friends. You will be missed – Apple.com

Apple CEO Tim Cook today sent the following email to all Apple employees:

Team,

I have some very sad news to share with all of you. Steve passed away earlier today.

Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing
human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.

We are planning a celebration of Steve’s extraordinary life for Apple employees that will take place soon. If you would like to share your thoughts, memories and condolences in the interim, you can simply email [email protected]

No words can adequately express our sadness at Steve’s death or our gratitude for the opportunity to work with him. We will honor his memory by dedicating ourselves to continuing the work he loved so much.

In his public life, Steve was known as a visionary; in his private life, he cherished his family. We are thankful to the many people who have shared their wishes and prayers during the last year of Steve’s illness; a website will be provided for those who wish to offer tributes and memories.

We are grateful for the support and kindness of those who share our feelings for Steve. We know many of you will mourn with us, and we ask that you respect our privacy during our time of grief.

Michelle and I are saddened to learn of the passing of Steve Jobs. Steve was among the greatest of American innovators – brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it.

By building one of the planet’s most successful companies from his garage, he exemplified the spirit of American ingenuity. By making computers personal and putting the internet in our pockets, he made the information revolution not only accessible, but intuitive and fun. And by turning his talents to storytelling, he has brought joy to millions of children and grownups alike. Steve was fond of saying that he lived every day like it was his last. Because he did, he transformed our lives, redefined entire industries, and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: he changed the way each of us sees the world.

The world has lost a visionary. And there may be no greater tribute to Steve’s success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented. Michelle and I send our thoughts and prayers to Steve’s wife Laurene, his family, and all those who loved him.

Steve, thank you for being a mentor and a friend. Thanks for showing that what you build can change the world. I will miss you.

Eric Schmidt:

“Steve Jobs is the most successful CEO in the U.S. of the last 25 years,” Google [GOOG 504.70 2.80 (+0.56%) ] Chairman Eric Schmidt said in a statement. “He uniquely combined an artists touch and an engineers vision to build an extraordinary company.. one of the greatest American leaders in history.”

I’m truly saddened to learn of Steve Jobs’ death. Melinda and I extend our sincere condolences to his family and friends, and to everyone Steve has touched through his work.

Steve and I first met nearly 30 years ago, and have been colleagues, competitors and friends over the course of more than half our lives.

The world rarely sees someone who has had the profound impact Steve has had, the effects of which will be felt for many generations to come.

For those of us lucky enough to get to work with him, it’s been an insanely great honor. I will miss Steve immensely.

Drawing from some of the most pivotal points in his life, Steve Jobs, chief executive officer and co-founder of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, urged graduates to pursue their dreams and see the opportunities in life’s setbacks — including death itself — at the university’s 114th Commencement on June 12, 2005.

I gave you a tough time today. I thought you didn’t come up to some imaginary bar I held in my head. I didn’t get why you didn’t come out with bigger news. I didn’t get why everyone in my network was telling me about the big things that were planned that didn’t come out.

Now we know.

Today a guy I know at Facebook told me that Apple just “went dark” this weekend and stopped answering emails and phone calls (they had amazing new iPhone and iPad apps and a new developer platform all ready for announcing). Folks inside Facebook thought they had done something massively wrong. No, they hadn’t. Truth is you had something deeper to deal with.

The fact that you, and your team, went on stage, knowing that Steve Jobs was close to death, is a testament to your professionalism. I felt that you had called it in a bit, but now I know the truth. You weren’t calling it in at all. You were doing an amazing job while knowing what was coming.

Today I feel guilty because I gave you a tough time about your first press conference. Now that I know what was going on behind the scenes I owe you an apology. I’m sorry, I owe you and your team one.

My heart is with you during this tough time.

The Reason Steve Jobs Wore His Turtleneck Outfit

Steve Jobs’ iconic outfit of a turtleneck shirt, jeans and runners has left many people wondering why he chose that particular outfit. In fact it has been noted that even Apple employees jeered their boss’s scheme for a corporate outfit. So why did Jobs choose such an outfit?

Today Gawker received an excerpt from the upcoming Steve Jobs bio written by Walter Isaacson’s on the true reason behind Jobs’ turtleneck outfit:

On a trip to Japan in the early 1980s, Jobs asked Sony’s chairman Akio Morita why everyone in the company’s factories wore uniforms. He told Jobs that after the war, no one had any clothes, and companies like Sony had to give their workers something to wear each day. Over the years, the uniforms developed their own signatures styles, especially at companies such as Sony, and it became a way of bonding workers to the company. “I decided that I wanted that type of bonding for Apple,” Jobs recalled.

Sony, with its appreciation for style, had gotten the famous designer Issey Miyake to create its uniform. It was a jacket made of rip-stop nylon with sleeves that could unzip to make it a vest. So Jobs called Issey Miyake and asked him to design a vest for Apple, Jobs recalled, “I came back with some samples and told everyone it would great if we would all wear these vests. Oh man, did I get booed off the stage. Everybody hated the idea.”

In the process, however, he became friends with Miyake and would visit him regularly. He also came to like the idea of having a uniform for himself, both because of its daily convenience (the rationale he claimed) and its ability to convey a signature style. “So I asked Issey to make me some of his black turtlenecks that I liked, and he made me like a hundred of them.” Jobs noticed my surprise when he told this story, so he showed them stacked up in the closet. “That’s what I wear,” he said. “I have enough to last for the rest of my life.”

Excerpt from “Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson. Reprinted with permission.

As there are numerous quotes from Steve Jobs I am sure we all have our favourites. Thus, I am going to leave it up to you to leave us your favourite quotes in the comments.

Quote #1: Time Is Precious

My favorite things in life don’t cost any money. It’s really clear that the most precious resource we all have is time.

Quote #2: No One Wants To Die

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.

Quote #3: Follow Your Heart

Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Quote #4: Life Is Brief

We don’t get a chance to do that many things, and every one should be really excellent. Because this is our life. Life is brief, and then you die, you know? So this is what we’ve chosen to do with our life.

Quote #5: You’ll Know It’s There

When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back.

Quote #6: Commencement Speech (via Domenic Seccareccia)

Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish

Quote #7: The Way Of Life (via Kalsteiner71)

When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money.That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is – everything around you that you call life, was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing. It’s to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it.

I think that’s very important and however you learn that, once you learn it, you’ll want to change life and make it better, cause it’s kind of messed up, in a lot of ways. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.

There are a ton of great quotes I didn’t include so it’s your job to let us know about them in the comments section. What are you waiting for? Share your favourite quotes!

Steve Jobs’ Speech Notes Were Even Gorgeous

We have seen just the careful, precise, and eloquent designs Apple comes up with for not only their product, but their packaging, signs, stores, even gift cards. Apple loves to make very incredible, yet simple designs in almost everything they do. One of the shockers is just how simple Steve Job’s presentation notes were, when he was presenting the first iPhone back in 2007.

Steve Job’s did not need a huge list of points splattered on cue cards, but simple couple of lines, to change everything about the phone market. If you think those things under the book are iPhones, you are correct! They were models of the first iPhone that have special attachments on them which allowed him to do video on the big screen behind him. Why were there three of them? Two were backups just in case something happened to the other. We all remember what happened the one presentation where his WiFi signal crashed on stage, and demanded everything to turn off their WiFi. It pays to have backups.

When you give presentations, do you need something simple like this, or do you have more detailed notes to insure you remember everything? Tell us how you do it in the comments below.

UPDATE #1: Apple’s Homepage Pays Tribute To Steve Jobs With A Video And A Message From CEO Tim Cook

One year ago today the world lost a great man, a man who revolutionized the mobile phone, personal computer, and tablet. Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple Inc., died October 5th, 2011 while battling cancer. In order to pay respect to Steve Jobs, Apple has updated their home page with a short video tribute and a message from the present CEO Tim Cook.

Head over to Apple.com and you’ll see a simple page with only a video, which contains quotes and anecdotes from Steve Jobs days as Apple CEO synced to some peaceful and inspiring music. After the video ends, a message from Tim Cook appears. He writes that the company’s valueshave“originated from Steve and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple”.

Here’s the full message from Tim Cook:

Steve’s passing one year ago today was a sad and difficult time for all of us. I hope that today everyone will reflect on his extraordinary life and the many ways he made the world a better place.

One of the greatest gifts Steve gave to the world is Apple. No company has ever inspired such creativity or set such high standards for itself. Our values originated from Steve and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple. We share the great privilege and responsibility of carrying his future legacy into the future.

I’m incredibly proud of the work we are doing, delivering products that our customers love and dreaming up new ones that will delight them down the road. It’s a wonderful tribute to Steve’s memory and everything he stood for.